Vehicle quests, how do I hate all y’all?

I think I’ve posted before about the new “vehicle quests” in the World of Warcraft MMO. I right-click a gun, or a tank, or a dragon, or whatever, and I’m off on a new kind of adventure. An adventure that sucks. It takes my character completely out of the game and asks me to bring my considerably lousy click and twitch skills. This is not what I signed up for.

I found another reason to hate these quests. I like making lots of characters. I like trying a particular quest with one character and then trying it with another character. My warrior charges in there and swings away. My mage stands back and fires off spells. But vehicle quests are the same every time I play them. They’re not played by my character, they’re played by me.

There are lots of games that are all about me. But an MMO is about my character, not about me. They used to call them “roleplaying” games. I build a character and use that persona to solve problems. Not my platformer jumping flying shooting skills, those are for Pitfall and Street Fighter. When I play an MMO I want to use my character. That’s why I play.